Office – Old Union Rm137

Office Hours – T 4:30 – 5:30 PM or by Appointment

Web – www.acs.ilstu.edu/staff/parmenter/parmenter.htm

Mission of the College of Applied Science and Technology

The College of Applied Science and Technology has the primary mission to provide high quality educational programs which emphasize the relationship between theory and practice. It is the intent of the College to:

Relate theory and principles drawn from the basic sciences and/or the humanities to areas of application within each of the College's academic programs.
Foster development of analytical skills necessary to solve real-world problems through appropriate applications of modern technology.
Provide an appropriate professional and career orientation to the application of knowledge in each of the respective disciplines.
Establish collaborative partnerships with professional communities affiliated with its programs to discover, interpret, and apply knowledge to public policies and professional practices that improve the economy and quality of life.
Provide course offerings and internship experiences that are commensurate with the needs of graduates for professional growth and advancement.
Offer courses that stress applications of technology to students in other disciplines throughout the University.

Within the College mission statement is the reflection of the primary advantage which makes its activities particularly significant to Illinois State's future, i.e., the applied nature of the disciplines within the college. As the larger community increasingly looks to the University for the resolution of its real-world problems, the College is well positioned to respond with education, research and other public services.

Course Objective

It is the objective of this course to give the student a basic understanding of the following concepts:

1. Effective use of workstation computing environments.

2. Computer network concepts and use.

3. Management of hardware resources.

4. Management of software resources.

Educational Materials

1. Text - Inside the PC, Eighth Edition, Peter Norton

2. Class hand-outs – as provided

3. Selected current publication items – as assigned

Evaluation and Special Incentives

1. In-class quizzes over assigned material may be given at any time. Stay current!

2. Mallard On-line Quizzes that may be taken via Internet may be utilized, also.

3. You may have one or more short research assignments.

4. There will be at least 3 major exams, one of which will be a comprehensive final exam.

5. There may be opportunities to earn “extra credit points” for optional assignments.

6. You can expect to be rewarded for good attendance and class participation.

7. Your final grade will be based on a percentage of total points as follows:
90% = A
80% = B
70% = C
60% = D
<60% = F
This grade scale is firm. Quiz and exam scores will not be “curved”.

Quizzes

You should be prepared for a quiz over assigned sections of the text-book at any time. Quizzes over assigned text material may be announced or un-announced. You should also be prepared for quizzes over hand-out material and assigned publications. Mallard On-line Quizzes may be assigned that will be taken outside of class during a defined time period. Typically, you can expect these quizzes to be available for a period of at least 48 hours and have 3 attempts to improve your score.

Research Assignments

Research assignments will be on current technology developments or other topics related to our course of study. Typically, you can expect these assignments to require you to utilize a minimum of three print and/or on-line information sources to produce a 2 to 3 page paper. These may be required assignments or optional “extra-credit” assignments.

Exams

Exams must be taken at the scheduled date and time. Students who are not present for an exam receive a zero for that exam grade. Students who arrive late for an exam may, at the discretion of the instructor, be barred from taking the exam. If allowed to take the exam, late students will be allowed no extra time beyond the allotted exam period.

Any person found cheating on an exam, or aiding another individual, will receive an “F” in the course and will be referred to university authorities for disciplinary action.

Attendance/Class Participation

Attendance (or lack of) may be considered as a portion of your total class grade. You are expected to attend all class meetings. You can also expect to be rewarded on your grade evaluation for class participation.

Late Work

All assignments will have assigned due dates. Unless otherwise specified, all assignments are due at the beginning of class on the assigned due date. Late work will be penalized 20 % for each day it is late.

Drop Policy

The University procedure for dropping a course will be followed, per the current catalog.

Ethical Conduct

Illinois State University, its colleges and departments expect students to maintain a high standard of ethical conduct in the completion of their studies. Cheating on exams, quizzes or other assignments will not be tolerated. Students should refer to the “Academic Integrity” section of the current catalog for information on offenses involving academic dishonesty.

Class Schedule

Attached is the tentative class schedule for the semester. While it may be necessary to make some adjustments to this tentative class schedule, every effort will be made to adhere to the attached schedule.

Tentative Schedule

Week	Beginning	Topic	Chapter
1	1/14	Introduction How Computers Work	Ch 1, 2
2	1/22	Understanding Bits, Nybbles & Bytes Conversions	Ch 3
3	1/28	Understanding your PCs parts	Ch 4
4	2/4	Working with your PC	Ch 5, 6
5	2/11	Exam 1 Understanding PC processors	Ch 7
6	2/18	How your PC thinks Data storage	Ch 8, 9
7	2/25	Disks Input devices	Ch 10, 12
8	3/4	PCs Memory	Ch 9
9	3/11	Spring Break
10	3/18	Seeing the Results: PC displays	Ch 13
11	3/25	Printers	Ch 14
12	4/1	Exam 2 PCs Operating systems	Ch 17
13	4/8	How humans instruct PCs	Ch 18
14	4/15	Multimedia	Ch 20, 21
15	4/22	PCs, the Internet, the future and you, HTML	Ch 26, 27
16	4/29	Review
17	5/6	Final – Comprehensive Monday 5/6 at 7:50 AM STV139A